


Unlike Her

by h0ldthiscat



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, On the Run, fic prompts, fic requests, on the run tour
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 12:37:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4746722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/h0ldthiscat/pseuds/h0ldthiscat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is no doubt that she is the girl who drops everything to disappear across the country with her partner. There is no doubt that she is the girl who gave up her baby. There is no doubt that she has a lot of reasons to be drinking at 2pm on a Wednesday.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unlike Her

It’s unlike her to get drunk at 2pm on a Wednesday, but this whole thing is unlike her. Or maybe it is like her, and she’s just never been herself before. Maybe she is the girl who sneaks her parents’ smokes and gets tattoos and has sex with her professors. There is no doubt that she is the girl who drops everything to disappear across the country with her partner. There is no doubt that she is the girl who gave up her baby. There is no doubt that she has a lot of reasons to be drinking at 2pm on a Wednesday. 

X

He barrels through the door of the bar next to the truck stop. Some distantly familiar country song plays on the jukebox and billiards clank in the next room over. Her laugh bubbles up from the bar, uninhibited and flirtatious. 

His eyes scan, looking to match an image to the sound. He finds her leaning back in a stool, elbows resting on the bar, flanked on either side by two beefy looking men, one in a cowboy hat and one in a leather jacket. A menagerie of empty shot glasses litter the bar behind her, and another one rests in her hand, the amber liquid inside threatening to slosh over with every move of her body. 

She and her new compadres lock eyes and nod their heads as they count together, “One… two… three!” They down the shots and whoop with laughter.

Mulder sighs and heads toward her, not liking the way the man in the leather jacket puts his hand on her arm. Scully sees him walking towards her and her eyes light up.

“Baby!” she cries, and jumps up to give him a hug and a sloppy, Tequila-flavored kiss.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were hanging out with the village people?” he asks, gesturing to her friends at the bar.

“What’s wrong with your face?” she asks, the alcohol giving her an uncharacteristic childishness. “You have grouchy face.”

“You have drunky face,” he counters clumsily. The man in the cowboy hat chuckles, and Mulder can’t tell if it’s at his poorly-constructed comeback or at his expense. Either way, he’s getting pissed. “Come on Scu--Come on, the sooner we leave the better.”

He takes her hand and pulls her to standing but the man in the leather jacket pulls her back toward the bar. “Sweetie, is this guy bothering you?”

Scully looks very confused, but even in her inebriated state she shuffles toward Mulder and says, “No.”

“You sure?” the other man asks, standing up. When Mulder tells this story later, he says that the man cracked his knuckles, but Scully’s not sure. 

Either way, Mulder’s reaction is immediate and instinctual: he punches the man square on the jaw. The man in the cowboy hat tumbles back, sending shot glasses rolling down the bar. Before his friend in the jacket can retaliate, Mulder grabs Scully’s hand and they run toward the door, the bartender’s shout of, “Hey man, you can’t punch people in here!” ringing in their ears. 

He leads her through the parking lot, gravel crunching under their feet. She is laughing wildly, and then he feels a sharp tug on his hand. He turns to see her face pale, her eyes searching the ground back and forth in front of her until she doubles over and throws up, the mess splattering at her feet. It’s mostly tequila; they haven’t eaten much today, and the sweet smell of alcohol hits him almost instantly. 

“Oh, Scully…” He rubs her lower back, tucks her hair behind her ears, but it’s getting long, and she snapped her last remaining hair tie this morning. He knows there’s a rubber band in the middle console of the car, but it’s too far back across the parking lot, and he doesn’t want to leave her. 

She comes up for air, resting her hands on her knees and sniffing. “Fuck. I’m sor--”

She bends over and dry heaves this time, spluttering and coughing in a way that reminds him of an even more unpleasant time, when he’d catch her curled over the toilet with crimson tissues and insistencies of, “I’m fine, Mulder.”

When she raises her head this time, a tear rolls down her cheek, but he’s not sure if she’s actually crying or not. “I’m sorry,” she says, and her tone of voice tells him everything he needs to know: why she’d wandered away from their car at the truck stop, why she’d taken up drinking with two complete strangers, why everything hurts a little bit. 

All he can say is, “No, I’m sorry,” and wrap her in a tight hug. In her sneakers she tucks neatly under his chin and he rubs her shoulders until she stops crying, vomit drying in the corners of her mouth in a truck stop parking lot in South Dakota.


End file.
